Linkbar

downthetubes is undergoing some main site refurbishment...

Saturday, 7th October 2017

The downthetubes news blog was assimilated into our main site back in 2013, but we're glad you're here, because that's currently undergoing some under the bonnet refurb! So we've brought this blog back from the dead to tide us over.

We expect to be back up and running next week, just before the 2017 Lakes International Comic Art Festival - see you there?

Hop over to www.downthetubes.net for other British comics news, comic creating guides, interviews and much more!

Thursday, 7 April 2011

The Strange Attractions of Alan Moore

(with thanks to Pádraig Ó Méalóid): The most recent issue of Strange Attractor Journal contains, amongst much else, the text for Alan Moore's unfinished John Dee opera, focusing on the life of the well known English mage, which he was originally meant to be developing alongside Damon Albarn and Gorillaz, before they went their seperate ways on this.

"I believe that, besides the complete unfinished text for the opera - if you see what I mean - there are also notes on staging and other aspects of the project," Pádraig Ó Méalóid tells us.

"In some ways, the most fascinating of Alan's works are the unfinished ones, as the potential they represent will always be just outside our reach," feels Pádraig. "However, more information is coming about about some of these: for my own part, I was thrilled to be able to publish the pages from Big Numbers #3 online (here on Padraig's LiveJournal), and Gary Spencer Millidge's upcoming biography of Alan contains a copy of the legendary Big Numbers wall chart, so much that was once unknown will now be revealed.

"Alan also spoke to me recently about how Halo Jones would have finished up, and now we have this piece about his John Dee opera.

Who knows? The 1963 annual might be next. OK, maybe not..."

As well as its Alan Moore conetnt, the eagerly awaited fourth edition of the acclaimed anthology series, featuring nearly 20 new articles exploring the outer shores of culture, history and experience.

First appearing in 2004, Strange Attractor Journal has been described as "one of the most weirdly beautiful, beautifully weird magazines of the past hundred-odd years" (by the Independent on Sunday) and "what you get when poetic archaeologists of the imagination gather their finest jewels" (by Erik Davis).

The site downthetubes.net, which began publishing in 1999, is edited by John Freeman whose credits include editor of Doctor Who Magazine, Star Trek Magazine, Star Wars Magazine, and Marvel UK titles such as Overkill, Death's Head II, Warheads and others. He's currently editor of the upcoming Strip Magazine for Print Media Productions.

About the Writers:

• Matthew Badham has written features for Judge Dredd: The Megazine, the Forbidden Planet International blog and more

• Jeremy Briggs contributes news, reviews, interviews and historical articles on British comics. He is a guest writer on Steve Holland's UK comics history blog, Bear Alley, and has written for Comics International, TV Zone, Spaceship Away and Omnivistascope.

• David Hailwood has written comic strips for various publications, including TOXIC, Accent UK, Bulletproof and Futurequake. He also writes comedy material for TV, and regularly contributes to the Temple APA (a showcase for UK comic writers and artists).

• Andy Luke is a writer who draws: he's s created the eponymous Andy Luke's Comic Book, Gran, Absence: a comic about epilepsy, Hold the Phones, It's Alex Jones, and graphic novel, The Watch Thief. He's written about comics too, mainly for Bugpowder.com, and has been involved with the Caption comics festival in Oxford. He currently lives in Belfast with a large box of pasta and a 7ft tall cigarette, and can be found online at http://andy-luke.com and http://awriterwhodraws.com

• Ian Wheeler is a freelance writer who also edited the highly-acclaimed British comics fanzine Eagle Flies Again.